


Lemonworld

by Coraleeveritas



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Army, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Ficlet, Song fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-18
Updated: 2018-02-18
Packaged: 2019-03-20 18:48:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13723809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Coraleeveritas/pseuds/Coraleeveritas
Summary: "You and your sister live in a LemonworldI want to sit in and die"Lemonworld, The National





	Lemonworld

**Author's Note:**

> While I'm still working on my big multi chapter fic, here's something short that's based on the song Lemonworld by The National. I've been meaning to write JB for this one for ages but it's only recently that I got it all down.
> 
> Thank you to RoseHeart for all her encouragement.
> 
> All mistakes are mine but anything you recognise is not.

The invitation was a good thing Jaime had reluctantly decided as he'd embarked on the journey from Kings Landing. It was a good thing to be out from under his father's thumb and away from the capital for a few weeks while the summer sun burned its citizens to a crisp. A good thing for his recovery to be surrounded by lush countryside rather than steel and concrete, a good thing to stay with a happy family instead of his own tempestuous relations.

It was just a shame, Jaime thought as the waters beneath him turned from a murky nondescript colour to clear sapphire blue waves, that he had no desire to exist anywhere since the bloody incident that had ended his military career. He'd given his heart to the army when it had been rejected elsewhere, sentimentality pushing him into the world of his father and grandfather, and now it felt like there was nothing but a huge void in his life. His men, honorary brothers and cousins after so many months overseas in close quarters, had all come back in boxes draped in their ancestral colours, the war taking dozens of lives but leaving one tired, cynical man to tell the tale.

One night his brother had been deep in his cups, he'd joked that it had been Jaime's expensive college education that had kept him breathing. That their father, the great Tywin Lannister, wouldn't let something as insignificant as the Stranger get in the way until he'd had his money's worth out of his elder son.

So it was strange that Tywin's right hand man in foreign lands decades earlier, General Selwyn Tarth, had taken to retired life out on a sparsely populated island without a grumble or gripe. Stranger still, Jaime considered, was how quickly he'd agreed to act as an unconventional halfway house for a barely healed former soldier when the Evenfall estate was still reeling from Selwyn's unexpected marriage to a red headed, stern faced Riverlands widow.

Jaime had been at the wedding the previous year, though it now seemed like half a lifetime ago. Back when he'd been obligated to wear his dress greens to such events, he had drank champagne, made small talk with military men he knew by reputation alone and tried to keep his sharp tongue in check until the dance floor had cleared. It hadn't been long, though, before he started forsaking dances with prettier girls to spend more time with the only one who truly interested him, Selwyn's surviving daughter, Brienne. She was too tall, too freckled, too stubborn but she was one of the few people he'd met over the years who didn't have any qualms in quelling his predilections for being an asshole. He would have never expected to enjoy the evening but by the time they'd stopped trading insults, the hours rolling on to provide chances to discuss career choices and work out routines and family expectations, they found an almost amicable agreement that meant Brienne no longer baulked at his dancing suggestions.

And when he'd been too tired, too drunk to find a way back to the hotel she hadn't hesitated in offering him a place to stay, making up the bed in one of their tiny holiday cottages and leaving a couple of painkillers by the glass of water on the nightstand.

She wasn't there the next morning when he felt the sudden urge to say goodbye properly, her work day starting near the crack of dawn, and she wasn't there now to meet him off the ferry despite Jaime double checking his arrival time wouldn't clash with any of her extracurricular responsibilities. Though her absence wasn't surprising given how little contact they'd had in recent months, he'd been encouraged to write letters back in rehab to help his damaged muscles relearn fine motor skills and Brienne had been the only one to regularly respond in the same way though communications had trailed off since, Jaime couldn't help but feel a sharp tug of disappointment, sliding a little deeper into the fog of loss that trailed at his feet.

It was the swans he noticed first as they pulled up to the main house on the Evenfall estate, Selwyn opting for a classic rock station on the radio rather than mindless chatter for the five minutes it took to drive from the dock, leaving him with more time than Jaime wanted to watch the world whizz by the windows. No sooner had he opened the car door then the sounds of children filled the air with shrieks and shouts as they used the giant white inflatables in their game, the brood the new Mrs Tarth had brought from the mainland clearly having already settled in to their new home.

One of the swans had been savaged in the rough and tumble, left to slowly drain of air and die in the open, the other being used by the younger boys as a shield against their sister's portable water canon. It was such a normal, summer vacation family scene, a far cry from his own economically comfortable and emotionally reserved upbringing, that Jaime nearly didn't see Brienne until he was tripping over her long legs trying to reach the back door. Half hidden beneath a sun umbrella, she had been watching the kids play in a bathing suit that did nothing and everything for her athletic frame before his arrival, rising to her feet the second their eyes met.

He suddenly found it very difficult to breathe.

"Jaime," she acknowledged fondly, a hint of a blush spreading across her pale, freckled skin like an unwanted stain. Though, he considered, there was always the chance she'd caught the sun earlier and wasn't as pleased to see him as it might seem.

"Brienne," he replied, attempting a quick smirk that immediately hurt his cheeks from misuse. "You've sure got your hands full here. I thought the idea of school holidays was that you didn't have to act as a glorified babysitter for a few months over the summer."

"I'm their _sister_ ," she emphasised, folding her arms across her chest as his gaze swept up and down her body almost without conscious thought. "And as their sister, I'm morally obliged to throw the occasional summer pool party for no reason. Can I offer you a slice of lemon cake?"

He shook his head. "I'd rather start my stay with something less bitter."

"Lemonade, lemon curd tarts...?"

"Seriously?"

"It was Sansa's idea," she admitted, pointing at the teenager who was avoiding the flying water as best as she could. "Lemon everything for one day."

He found it easier to smile the second time, the urge to disappear inside until he'd withered away to nothing finally taking a temporary backseat. "Your very own lemon world."

"At least it was an easy request. They've...I'm sorry, I shouldn't be going on about-"

"No, I like hearing about your life."

"It's not that exciting, it's...h-how are you doing?"

He shook his head again, hating that his eyes were starting to prickle with the idea of unspilled tears from simply the amount of concern in her voice. "I don't-"

"You are going to be okay. We'll...I'm going to make sure of it," she promised like she was swearing allegiance to his cause, her too blue eyes blazing, and for the first time since he'd returned from one war zone or another, Jaime started to believe there might be some truth in that.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
